As Ephemeral as a song
by belleslettres
Summary: He enters each night, a shadow of midnight, as ephemeral as a song.    HarrySnape


Disclaimer: J K Rowling is the woman with the money, fame and golden pen. I just play with her toys, that's all.

(Warning: Strong angst. Slash.)

He enters each night, a shadow of midnight, as ephemeral as a song.

Lying in the dark, Harry can feel the slender fingers playing a gentle, artless melody along his neck, like feathery kisses reaching deep within him to touch him with a heartbreaking loveliness. He falls into the heady scent of power, potions and sorrow, a violent mix that is at once sad and breathtaking and provocative. The forehead brushes delicately along his earlobe as the intoxicating voice spills over his ears and makes him moan in savage appreciation.

The lips brush against his neck roughly, bruising and sending a thousand electric rushes along the slow trail down his neck to his chest, finally brushing his navel and pausing there for an eternity before the lips begin their exploration again.

The gentle flicks of the tongue on his body, worshipping the crevices and secrets of his body. Sending him again into frenzy, a torrent of emotions he can't even begin to put words to. The fingers that burn white hot trails down his spine as they stroke him, the dark eyes ablaze, staring so unflinchingly into his that Harry feels stripped bare even though his clothes already lay discarded in a trail from the sofa.

"My dark prince," he hisses, catching the palm in his and placing it flat against the bed, his own fingers exploring each line, each callus, with an unhurried dance that is at once more erotic than anything else. The lines on Severus' palm map out the million faults on his heart. Harry loves him for it. _My Severus._

All he can taste is the moment. All he can feel is the silky hair and soft sweaty skin and Severus' heart pressed against his, the pounding of both hearts exactly in sync. He can almost taste love from the lips he presses against fiercely, urgently, needily. _Even though Severus has never said he loved him. _

Harry feels his heart leaping, flying, dancing, with a perilous candour and earnestness that almost frightens him before he offers himself up fully, like a ritual sacrifice in a pagan rite. He will die before he lets go of the body that moves exactly in rhythm with his. _Like magic._

They breathe as one in these moments. Before they fuck and Severus leaves again. Before he remembers that Severus is Snape. Before he realises that he is in love with a man who will not- cannot, look at him without the shadow of darkness. Before he throws up again and breaks another mirror, just so he doesn't disgust himself with what he will see, what he can see every time he closes his eyes. He cannot look into his eyes because he shudders at what he knows he will find. _Are you a whore, Harry? _

Severus' hands clutch his hips and he tenses in frantic anticipation. Harry can feel the breath, warm against his neck, and the slight, slender fingers curved around him and his heart is pumping so fast he forgets to breathe for an instant. He can feel a hundred senses exploding into his mind all at the same time and he arches his back and rocks against his lovers' body tightly and wishes again that it would never end.

The sheets mould the mute statues of their bodies and quick breaths are the only sounds that escape the quiet. Harry wants desperately to cry, to close his eyes and fling his arms around the muscular shoulders and plead. But he doesn't and he looks away, frantically, at anything but the dark eyes that he feels embedded in his back.

A strange sad, proud look hangs in Severus' face as he stares at the silent child-man.

"Goodbye."

The farewell lies in the air, the two knowing that it is no more than a word. No more than an arbitrary reminder of their temporary non-relationship. And it hurts, Severus thinks, more than he can understand.

But Severus Snape understands everything, he reminds himself, lips curled in a bitter grimace, he knows everything except everything except nothing.

He leaves in a cloud of self-loathing and chagrin, half expecting Harry to tell him never to come back again. He wants fiercely to pretend Harry and him are strangers _(The Dark Lord knows all)_, until he remembers his name screamed out in ecstasy and he winces.

_He knows he will be back tomorrow and he wishes he could die. _

Fin.

Author's Note: I know it's painfully short, but it's still my baby and I love it. Review please.

Elizabeth.

" Normal love isn't interesting. I assure you that it's incredibly boring." –Roman Polanski.


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